Top Tether Limits for Carseats

It’s crazy. The “secret list” parents must consult to determine whether or not the top-tether component of the LATCH system can be used for an older child. Apparently, some automakers are unsure of the strength of their hardware, so they adopted unpublished weight limits. Other companies expect parents to know the exact weight of their child seat, and then subtract it from 65 to determine the weight limit for the child. Simple, huh? Is that a child with 10 pounds of winter clothes or no clothes?

To work around the confusion, some advocacy organizations had suggested that unless both carseat and vehicle owners manuals clearly specified a higher limit, parents should be instructed to use a very low 40 pound limit. Of course, there was nothing in most vehicle owner’s manuals to support this, causing some to wonder why we are trying to fear parents away from using top tethers! What to tell a parent who bought a $300 carseat with a 5-point harness system rated to 80 pounds? “Sorry, ma’am, you can’t use that critical safety feature past 40 pounds for your taller child who needs the tether the most. And I really can’t tell you why, but I’ve heard the company that made your car might have said so.“

Fortunately, some auto makers have been willing to go farther! Many now allow use of the top tether, an important safety feature, up to the maximum weight limit specified by the child restraint manufacturer. For example, Volkswagen recently adopted this guidance, making it much simpler for parents. The fact is that many parents don’t use the tether as it is, and those who do rarely realized that there were obscure limits for their use. No wonder why!

Why are some auto makers causing parents to doubt the strength of these anchors and why are they making it so confusing? We don’t know, but we do extend our appreciation to the following manufacturers who have adopted a more common sense approach and make it simpler for parents! These car makers defer to the child restraint manufacturer instructions for top-tether weight limits when used with a seatbelt for installation:

Audi

BMW

Chrysler *

Coda

Dodge *

Ferrari

Fiat

Ford

Hyundai

Infinity

Jaguar

Jeep *

Kia

Lexus

Lincoln

Lnd Rover

Maserati

Mercedes Benz

Mercury

MINI

NissanRam *

Rolls-Royce

Scion

Smart

Subaru

Toyota

Volkswagen

Volvo

Weight limits for use of the lower anchor component of LATCH vary considerably. Please consult your owners manual(s) for official guidance.

This is great information, Ulrike! I honestly had no idea that so many auto manufacturers were now deferring to the child restraint limits for top tether use. Now if only we could get GM and Honda to do the same, most (all?) of the most common automakers would be covered.

I hope that Honda changes before my 4YO hits 40 lbs (which will be a while yet) so that I don’t have to decide whether to make the parental decision of using the top tether past the vehicle’s limit. (Of course, the only reason I know about that limit is because I’m a CPS advocate, since Honda doesn’t make that information easily available … )

What’s the danger in going past the limit? If it fails, how is that less safe than not using it at all? I understand the limits on lower anchors, but can’t figure out why there would be limits on top tether use, considering that there’s no alternative that would serve the same function. I get the “it hadn’t been tested” rationale, but what’s the danger in the top tether breaking vs not having one at all?

Hi Arden, those are the same questions we have. We have always been told that in the event of a crash, the forward movement mitigated by the top tether even before the rare event of the anchor hardware bending or breaking would still be beneficial. Perhaps the only real danger is in the form of lawsuits, or perhaps added costs in making them strong enough to defer to the child restraint manufacturer? We don’t really know.

Arden and Darren, wouldn’t the risk of Top Tether Anchor failure be that it fails and then hits the child in the head/face/body?

I’ve wondered this myself in our older vehicle w/ retrofitted Top Tether Anchors, but have chosen to use them anyway for a few reasons. 1) Top Tethers are required here (Canada). 2) In the 90s it was common practice for automakers (Ford at least) to provide a DIY Anchor w/ instructions to use a torque wrench to added it yourself. I know for a fact that not everyone used a torque wrench. 3) We have been retrofitting Top Tether Anchors here for years and I’ve yet to see, hear or read about a failure. 4) If it does fail, it has done it’s job and saved my child head/neck skeletal/bone damage, so the risk of a (potential never happened before) contusion and/or laceration is the lesser of the two evils anyway.

Yes, one theoretical risk is that the hardware could fail in an unusually energetic crash, and the remaining hardware could strike an occupant if all or part of the top tether came completely detached. I imagine this risk is exceedingly small. Also, there is an identical risk of an unused tether system that is not stowed doing the same thing. SafetyBeltSafe USA has documented at least one case where this did happen with an unattached top tether:-(

We always suggest that parents consult their owners manuals for guidance. For example, in the past, Honda’s official guidance was to defer to the child restraint manufacturer for top tether weight limits, but when pressed for a number to print in 3rd party reference materials, they opted for a very low limit. In many cases, the simple lack of clear wording in the auto manufacturer’s manuals caused some advocacy organizations to infer that a 40-pound limit would be a “conservative” substitute for any omission. They assumed this would clarify the issue, but instead it only served to increase the confusion and possibly result in children being less safe.

In the past we have been told that there is data showing the risks of not adhering to arbitrarily low top-tether weight limits. To my knowledge, no such statistically significant data, peer-reviewed studies or published real-world risk of injury of this type as ever been made pubic, if it exists at all.